What turned you?

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abacacus
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30 Jan 2012, 1:54 am

LKL wrote:

abacacus wrote:

LKL wrote:

wrt the OP: I was born into a Catholic family and became agnostic based on Sunday School teachings and sermons (God sends Indonesian kids to hell just because they happened to be born somewhere without Christianity? How is that fair?), and became atheistic when I read the bible for myself (*shudder*). I sometimes now call myself a pantheist, which to me describes an emotional reaction of awe to the universe without requiring any sort of supernatural/transcendent/personal deity.

I thought pantheism was the believe of god in all things?

It is, roughly, the belief that the physical universe is god itself. It doesn't require the universe to be even remotely interested in this planet, much less any puny human; it doesn't even require the universe to have consciousness on any level.

Alright. Thanks for the explanation.

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TheKing
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30 Jan 2012, 2:19 am

Jory wrote:

Whenever someone asks me why I'm an atheist, I say, "Someone gave me a Bible."

i was baptized and raised Catholic, i went to CCD until 6th grade, i had my First Holy Communion in like 2nd or 3rd grade i don't exactly remember which, i was almost ready to start doing Confirmation classes, i was in St. Anthony's Childrens Choir for over 5 years, went to Church at least once a week but usually 2-3 times a week and when i was 14 my grandma convinced me to read the bible, i did and became atheist shortly after then tried several other religions all led me back to atheist and over the past 4 years i have gone back and forth between atheism and agnosticism, though last year i got into parody religions, my mom(Christian) got me the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster for my 17th birthday she supports me in my beliefs even if it's not her beliefs

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TheKing
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30 Jan 2012, 2:24 am

LKL wrote:

abacacus wrote:

LKL wrote:

I thought pantheism was the believe of god in all things?

it would be accurate to describe me as a Scientific Pantheist, what Richard Dawkins calls "sexed up atheism" i learned about Pantheism last summer

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Fnord
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30 Jan 2012, 7:51 pm

LiendaBalla wrote:

I read the bible to understand it better. Yep, I sure did.

There seems to be a lot of that going around.

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02 Feb 2012, 12:03 pm

Quote:

As I've already posted: "He made the Sea of cast metal, circular in shape, measuring ten cubits from rim to rim and five cubits high. It took a line that was a number of cubits equal to twenty-two of seven parts of the line across to measure around it." Even "And he made the molten sea of about ten cubits from brim to brim, round in compass, and the height thereof was about five cubits; and a line of about thirty cubits did compass it round about.", or "And he made the molten sea of ten cubits from brim to brim, round in compass, and the height thereof was five cubits; and a line of thirty-one and four-tenths of a cubit did compass it round about." would make more sense.

I'm curious, exactly where in the Bible does it say pi = 3?
And what on earth is a cubit...?

WilliamWDelaney
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02 Feb 2012, 12:58 pm

The reason that I became an atheist was that the god that I was taught to believe in sent people who disagreed with him to a bad place. I felt that this was a horrible way for a god to behave. Of course, knowing what I know now, that argument would never hold water.

The reason I remain an atheist presently is that I am a dessicated academic of the type that delivers long, boring lectures on arcane-sounding subject matter and gets angry because nobody else realizes how interesting and exciting the subject matter is.

CrazyCatLord
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02 Feb 2012, 1:10 pm

I don't think there was any particular event, issue, or line of reasoning that turned me. I simply grew up.

techstepgenr8tion
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02 Feb 2012, 2:46 pm

Confirmed catholic (highschool campus ministry) - > agnostic theist by late highschool or early college (investigating Buddhism, Gnosticism, etc.) -> waffling in my mid 20's -> atheist by 30.

I don't want to get into everything before the last part because its way too long a story and I wouldn't wish the eye strain in anyone. The last part - hard determinism got me thinking about the purpose of arbitrary suffering and the degree we have of it in this world in a different way than when I did believe in quite close to full internal locus of control. When I came to think of, not even my own suffering, I mean all of history and the weighted average, the worst broad cases, etc. I literally could not reverse engineer a purpose. To a certain degree pain makes us stronger and makes us adults, when it passes that point it fries us from the inside out, we become shadows of our former selves and it happens often. I tried to come up with an all-powerful deity (powerful enough to be running anything) and what they would be aiming to do and, its just too utterly incoherent and arbitrary to assign mission or long-term/eternal purpose.

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simon_says
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02 Feb 2012, 4:13 pm

Turned me? Into a vampire? Or turned me out? Like a prostitute?

Neither has happened yet. That I know of.

techstepgenr8tion
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02 Feb 2012, 4:19 pm

simon_says wrote:

Turned me? Into a vampire?

For me that was Peiking Vampire at a local buffet. Lestatte was hanging out too close to the back door apparently.

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Tim_Tex
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02 Feb 2012, 8:53 pm

Gwenwyn wrote:

I was raised in a sub-sect of christianity that often got called a cult (Christian Science, if you've heard of it). What people think it is, isn't what it is. Its pretty nice. More like buddhism than people might think. Anyway,

I had a super depression a few years ago, came out of it, started dating a guy who was evangelical. Going to his church scared the hell out of me (haha, right?). So many people there HATED Islam. My best friend growing up was islamic! And they condoned this hate? So I turned away from that and back to C.S.

I worked for a summer in Boston where the Mother Church is. C.S. felt like it was nice, but I discovered 'true adherents' were just as bigoted as anywhere else I'd seen. I didn't follow their version of what C.S. was, so I was basically shunned.

So I've dropped organized religion. If there is a hell, I'll be going there with most of the people on the planet. Thats where I'd rather be anyway: with those who suffer, to offer condolences, companionship, or at least commiseration. Why should I fear suffering after what I've been through on Earth? If there is a God, one that I could believe in, I doubt I'd be in hell - or that any but the most truly abhorrent would be.

So I'm... I'm not sure... agnostic? If you've read left hand of darkness, you've learned sometimes you just have to know the questions you can't answer.

To be specific: The people, not the philosophies (for the most part), turned me from religion.

Christian Science isn't a cult. I think it's because they confuse it with Scientology that they think it's a cult.

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Fnord
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02 Feb 2012, 8:55 pm

Tim_Tex wrote:

Christian Science isn't a cult. I think it's because they confuse it with Scientology that they think it's a cult.

A cult is a religion without political influence.

Tim_Tex
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02 Feb 2012, 9:01 pm

Anyway, I have always been a Christian.

What turned me from being an Evangelical Christian to being a Lutheran was that the Baptist and Pentecostal churches produced major sensory overloads, while the Lutheran churches were more ambient.

It didn't become about the issues and beliefs until the Episcopal Church ordained Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop. This is when I started believing that Christianity is about love, forgiveness, and peace, and that science and religion are reconcilable.

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Subotai
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03 Feb 2012, 12:57 pm

Atheist to Agnostic here. I got into reading about esotericism and mystical allegorical interpretations.
Pretty much an Agnostic but I put no stock in mainstream religious thought.

Cleekster
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07 Feb 2012, 8:33 pm

Hexagon wrote:

The non-existence of a deity or deities is rational and logical

I find the possibility of a Deity to be just as rational and logical.....and your position is unprovable being a negative.

Hexagon wrote:

and backed (although not proven) by biological and physical fact and theories.

Such as?

you guys act like Christianity has some kind of monopoly on the God concept......it isn't the only game in town

it also seems that many of you are confusing Atheism with ANTI-Theism

My spiritual journey has taken me from Atheism to evangelical Christianity to Unitarian Universalism to Deism (my current position).

CrazyCatLord
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08 Feb 2012, 8:14 am

Cleekster wrote:

Hexagon wrote:

The non-existence of a deity or deities is rational and logical

I find the possibility of a Deity to be just as rational and logical.....and your position is unprovable being a negative.

The assumption of nonexistence until proven otherwise is rational and logical. Very few atheists think that a (generic, undefined) god can't possibly exist. We'd simply like to see convincing evidence before we believe in something.

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